- Transparency: 242 pages
- Publisher: Penguin UK
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0141025808
- ISBN-13: 978-0141025803
- Product Dimensions: 18 x 10.6 x 2.2 cm
- Shipping Weight: 159 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars See all reviews (52 customer reviews)
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Most helpful customer reviews
47 of 52 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
Interesting but /and Light,
By
This review is from: Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores The Hidden Side Of Everything (Hardcover)
Calling this a book on economics hasn't scared people away - with the book #3 on the Amazon.com listings and #5 here on .ca, people are clearly buying into the author's quirky insights into the world around us.Freakonomics is an interesting collection of observations, never conceding to any agenda whatsoever. It's entertaining, but never really takes you anywhere. Personally, I would have hoped that it would at least attempt to spur interest in economics and econometric methods, but in the end it reads more like an episode of Seinfeld - a book about, well, nothing. It's an easy read, achievable on a single rainy day, and certainly not challenging for the average reader with no economics background. But I would encourage folks who do pick it up to consider the usefulness of the correlation/causality distinction and the methods of analysis beyond the description here. Not many of you will pick up an economics or statistics text because of this, but maybe if there were more books like this which make it interesting and applicable in our daily lives, we would all have a better understanding and appreciation for our strange little world at large.
6 of 7 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
This book gets me thrown out of parties,
By Barry Tighe "Barry Tighe - Author The Spawate... (Spawater, Britanicca) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Freakonomics (Revised Edition) (Hardcover)
Freakonomics gets me thrown out of a lot of parties. Now that I know what really makes the world turn I cannot resist butting in on folk's conversations and putting them right.`Zero tolerance', someone will say, `that's what cut crime in New York'. `No it didn't', says I, `it was the 1973 legalisation of abortion that cut crime. Fewer young men means fewer young criminals.' A few dirty looks and off I go to another group. `My estate agent is marvellous; she sold my house in no time. A little under my asking price but she got me the best deal she could'. `No she didn't', I interrupt. `She sold your house below your asking price for a quick sale. She makes more money selling lots of houses cheaply than fewer houses for a fair price.' More unfriendly stares. Next group. `Drug dealers are all rich, living off the backs of their victims'. `Oh yeah? Says I, `Then why do most of them live with their moms?' And so on until they show me the door. Freakonomics has turned me into a know-all. It explains the real reasons things happen as opposed to the conventional thinking. Written in a style that tells you that you are among friends, Freakonomics leads you gently from a world of easy assumptions to a world of questioning. You will never be quite the same again. My only bicker is that it is too short. Are they writing a Freakonomics II? I do hope so. Maybe they can explain why know-alls get thrown out of parties.
8 of 10 people found the following review helpful
3.0 out of 5 stars
Intelligent yet lacking,
By
This review is from: Freakonomics (Revised Edition) (Hardcover)
Steven Levitt is clearly a brilliant man. An intellectual that isn't afraid to rock the boat with some controversial yet well-thought ideas. The book identifies some very interesting trends and presents them in a straight-forward readable manner.However, Levitt's ideas are not explored in enough detail to sufficiently enforce his arguments. It almost seems that the publishers have dumbed it down to the level of the ordinary person in order to sell more books. I haven't read the expanded edition, but I hope Levitt provides some of the background that is lacking in this edition.
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